Page 9 - Black Velvet Rock Magazine Issue 102

BV102 pg06-09 andy black _BV102 pg09 12/09/2019 23:05 Page 4

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easy for you to say, ‘cause people think pets. I had family members who volunteered do to help an animal is just to take care of
you’re good-looking’ or whatever else, and at shelters. I was always around the culture them and to remember that if you have in-
I’m not trying to brag by saying that. What of helping animals from the time I was very vested your time, even for a moment, into a
I’m saying is that that’s an element of what little, so… it was just ingrained in me and it’s cute little baby animal, when they grow up
my audience has been for a certain amount just something that is very important to me. you still have to take care of them. It’s just
of time. The truth of the matter is that that’s I think that one of the biggest problems that about being conscientious of things that are
not how I grew up. I was not conventionally we have right now is just a lack of accounta- living and need compassion.”
attractive. I was not talked to by girls at all. I bility for people that take animals into their
was called Chunk because I looked like homes. Obviously the meat industry is nd so, with a song called ‘Feast Or
Chunk from The Goonies when I was in mid- something that is monstrous when it comes AFamine’, we end by asking Andy
dle school and growing up. I was not some- to how large it is and how difficult it would what he’s hungry for now.
one that everyone pointed to and said ‘That’s be to wipe it out right away or something like He replies, “You know, really what I’d like
the beautiful person who’s going to grow up that, whereas the truth of the matter is that it more than anything is just to be able to con-
to be the rock star’. I just wanted it. I wanted would not be that difficult to lower the level tinue to create for a living. If I can continue
it to be this way. I wanted to wear a certain of homeless animals that are walking to make things that weren’t there before and
type of clothes. I wanted to be on stage and around, particularly in the United States be paid to do that, that’s kind of the dream,
be this character. I didn’t do anything else. where people just don’t take care of the ani- regardless of on what level. If I can just take
All I ever did was think about it and work to- mals that they have or they get rid of them the things that are in my mind and put them
wards it and create what it was going to be, when they’re old or they leave them out to somewhere and give them to people and
and that’s really all it takes. I’m not a remark- die or they don’t get them spayed or people go, ‘Yeah, we want that,’ that would
able singer. I’m not a remarkable person. I’m neutered so they have puppies and they be fantastic. I’ve been hungry for that forever
not even educated. I didn’t finish school. I don’t know what to do with those. I can’t say and probably now more so than ever, just
don’t have anything that someone else does- how often I run around my neighbourhood looking at going ‘that’s what I want’. When
n’t have. I just wanted it more than maybe and I’ll just see a dog walking by. And I live you’re little you don’t know exactly what it is
the people sitting next to me at the desk at in a fairly nice neighbourhood. It’s not like I that you want. You think ‘Maybe I want to be
school, and that’s what’s most important. If I live in a place where there should just be an- the biggest star of all time, maybe I want to
can be a hero to anyone, it’s just to say that imals walking around because the truth of do this/that’, really at this point in my life the
I am you and literally nothing that I do on a the matter is that for some cultures that is thing I want the most is just to continue to
daily basis is in any way anything that isn’t the case; it’s very commonplace for dogs to do this.”
attainable for you that you couldn’t do.” just almost be wild. But I get a little bit angry Visit www.andyblackmusic.com for more
When asked if Andy has any heroes of when I go ‘These people can afford to take info.
his own outside of the music world, he says care of their animals and they’re just not
he doesn’t have to look too far. doing it’. I think that when it comes to heroes Words & Photos By Shari Black Velvet
“Both of my parents have been tremen- the most simple gesture that someone could
dously heroic in their lifetime and to
me are massive heroes. My dad has
just been the greatest supporter of
me my whole life and has really set
the bar for me for how to support
someone. When it comes to being
there all the time, working your ass
off to make sure they have every-
thing, I can’t say enough. And then
just from a practical perspective,
looking at the career path that my
mother’s gone through: She dropped
out of college; she was a waitress es-
sentially. She was a manager at a
diner and throughout my life, she
went from that to working in the cafe-
teria at the hospital to working in a
specific department at the hospital to
now being the head of a major depart-
ment in one of the United States’
largest children’s hospitals and did
that by finishing her schooling
throughout her adulthood, working
her ass off, doing things that other
people weren’t willing to do and is
now in a position where she’s a high-
ranking person at a hospital that she
once worked in the cafeteria at. That’s
the type of stories to me that are
heroic.”
Whether Andy classes himself a
hero or not, we think he’s definitely
done some admirable things, both in-
side and out of the rock world. In
2017, with a known love for animals,
he posted about stopping puppy mills
for the Humane Society of the U.S. We
ask him about that – and it’s some-
thing else that was inspired by his
parents.
“I guess a lot of my love of ani-
mals comes from probably my mom
more than anywhere else,” Andy
says. “I was always taught to have a
love and respect of animals from the
time I was very little. We always had
ANDY BLACK